Fatal Road Collisions (1831A/21)
Request
Under the Freedom of Information Act I am applying for the following information:
1) Between 1/4/2016 – 31/3/2019 how many fatal road collisions did your force investigate?
2) Of these, how many collisions involved the deceased and the driver/rider knowing each other?
3) Between 1/4/2016 – 31/3/2019 how many drivers involved in fatal collisions were prosecuted (charged) with murder under the Homicide Act?
Response
Our data are not organised in such a way as to allow us to provide this information within the appropriate (cost) limit within the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act (see ‘Reason for Decision’ below).
Although excess cost removes the force’s obligations under the Freedom of Information Act, as a gesture of goodwill I have supplied information, relative to your request, retrieved before it was realised that the fees limit would be exceeded (see attached). I trust this is helpful, but it does not affect our legal right to rely on the fees regulations for the remainder of the request.
REASON FOR DECISION
Please note that researching each individual case would exceed the appropriate limit (FOIA, s.12). In relation to question 2 in order to locate and retrieve this information we would have to conduct a manual search of each individual record and try and ascertain this information from the circumstances, this search would exceed the FOI time limit
The cost of compliance with the whole of your request is above the amount to which we are legally required to respond, i.e. the cost of locating and retrieving the information would exceed the appropriate costs limit under section 12(1) of the FOI Act 2000. For West Midlands Police, the appropriate limit is set at £450, as prescribed by the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004, S.I. 3244.